Museum of Science and Industry

In case you missed it, Popular Science spent a few weeks profiling college laboratories where talented students are getting the opportunity to add to important academic research, learn about and prepare for highly skilled careers in the sciences, and, best of all, blow stuff up.

Popular Science’s series "The Labs that Go Boom" features ten awesome laboratories and their work, providing an interesting look not only at their research, but also at the types of scientific careers that exist for students with a passion for studying explosions and their aftermath.

The series includes a research lab that creates its own lightning bolts, a materials lab that works to prevent the use of dangerous improvised explosive devices, a forensic lab where students learn how to analyze the aftermath of bombings, and an astronomy lab where students simulate the collisions of planets and moons.

These laboratories add important research and technological advances in a number of fields, while preparing young students for careers in everything from plasma physics to demolition to medical engineering. As they learn and grow in their scientific field, these students are also advancing our understanding of things that go boom!

The Labs that Go Boom [Popular Science]

Image: JJ Sulin, Popular Science